


these beauteous forms

by sabinelagrande



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Future Fic, Leadership, Other, Past Keyleth/Vax'ildan, Shapeshifting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-27
Updated: 2017-08-27
Packaged: 2018-12-20 11:18:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11919792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabinelagrande/pseuds/sabinelagrande
Summary: Keyleth visits Marquet.





	these beauteous forms

Keyleth likes Marquet. The wind that whips through the desert reminds her of home, a comfort even though she's been living in Zephrah for centuries now; she's spent far more of her life in the winds than she ever did out of it, but it still sparks something in her when she's away, feeling that echo of it. Her destination is outside of Ank'harel, in a nearby mountain range. There is a spring there, fed from some source that the discoverer swore was magical when he built a retreat around it; she knew the discoverer many, many years ago, and has no doubt at all that the magic was a combination of bardic trickery and clever words. When she looks back, it seems his every word was magical, so she's not surprised it's still standing today.

A tree on the path leading to the spring opens up, and Keyleth flies through, only allowing her hawk form to drop as she approaches the front gates, the mantle fanning out behind her as she walks with purpose up to them, not even looking at the guards as she walks through. She is the Voice of the Tempest, and she will go where she pleases.

She has been playing that card for centuries and it still feels like a ruse.

There is an elderly gnome in a rocking chair sunning herself outside the nearest building. She looks old even to Keyleth, though Keyleth supposes their ages are similar; that was one thing she never got a straight answer on. The woman cracks an eye at Keyleth's approach, and when she sees that it's Keyleth, a grin crosses her face. She stands up, and any look of fragility or feebleness she might have put on drops.

"Kaylie," Keyleth says. "Retirement is treating you well, I see."

"I think I might do it a bit longer," Kaylie says. "It's like it was with dear old dad- I make the family do the work and I keep all the coin."

"I could stand some of that," Keyleth says. "We don't really use money though."

"I remember," Kaylie says wryly, and Keyleth remembers fondly Kaylie's one visit to Zephrah, where she cut someone's purse and ended up with a handful of interesting rocks. In the now, Kaylie cocks her head towards the main building of the spa, a towering structure carved into the mountain itself. "They got here a few hours ago. Put 'em up in the best room, and you're adjacent."

"Thanks," Keyleth says, and Kaylie nods to her before taking to her chair again, both to bask and play lookout, Keyleth suspects.

The path to the main building is uphill, and Keyleth bites her tongue, reminding herself not to show any weakness as she walks, not even in this sanctum so private that even the ruler of Ank'harel is a patron. Keyleth always assumed that one hundred, two hundred, three hundred, four hundred years later, she would feel comfortable in her body, feel the same sense of rightness and power that she does when she inhabits another form. And yet, even at the almost imperceptible rate she ages, her body is only adding more things to be comfortable with, creaks and pains that pile on ever so slowly and don't fade away.

But here in the moment, Keyleth is only a little winded when she reaches her destination. A familiar-looking brown-headed gnome holds open the door for her. "Be pleased," he says in Marquesian, and Keyleth almost laughs. The Scanlan she met would be so flummoxed by the entire scene.

Scanlan's great-grandson shows her up to her room, which is impeccably appointed, caretakers over the decades having toned down Scanlan's original vision for the place. He bows and sees himself out, and Keyleth only really waits for him to be down the hall before she leaves her room. Her many years have taught her patience, but they also taught her when waiting just gets in the way.

The door to J'mon's room is closed but not locked; Keyleth feels the cool shimmer of a magical barrier as she steps through it, but she disregards it. If J'mon wanted her harmed, they could have done it a hundred times over. A little ward to stop gnomish eavesdroppers is nothing.

Keyleth has been in this room before, but it's still a sight. The outer wall is curved, jutting out, all of it taken up by three huge open windows. There are shutters to keep out the rare but treacherous rains, but they're flung wide now, exposing a beautiful view of the desert. Keyleth finds that even now, she has the capacity to be awed by the natural world; she doesn't like to think about what it would be like if she lost that.

J'mon is waiting for her, sitting in profile, backlit by the late afternoon sun. They don't look a day older than the last time she saw them, but she's gotten used to that by now. So many other things change, so many other people change, but the beautiful J'mon Sa Ord uses their unfading loveliness as a shield. Somehow the spell isn't broken for Keyleth even though she's known for centuries that J'mon never has to age, even if Devo'ssa does.

"Keyleth," J'mon says, neither getting up nor extending a hand. "Welcome."

"It's good to see you, J'mon," she says. "It's been a while."

"Things are busy," they say, though Keyleth knows it's something of a lie. They've built Ank'harel into such an intricate clockwork of a city that their presence is often unnecessary; the mere promise of it is enough. Keyleth envies that, when managing Zephrah is such a different job. There are many things Keyleth envies J'mon for, but somehow it doesn't drop them in her estimation.

There is wine waiting, and the two of them drink; there's not much conversation, but it's the good kind of silence, the kind between people who understand each other enough to know when talking is unnecessary. This is far from the first time they've met like this, though it isn't often. They've just had enough time by now that even doing something seldomly means having done it many times.

"How do you do it?" Keyleth asks eventually, which is a thing she has asked before; J'mon is not the type to give away all their secrets at once, and each time she asks, she sees something new of them, like a flower opening.

"We cannot do anything else," J'mon says, and Keyleth still feels so small and so lost when J'mon includes her, like she can never live up to being like them no matter how long she has.

"Someone like you has a lot of time to try out other professions," she points out, a deflection.

"We are not ageless, and we are not deathless," J'mon says. "But we are the keepers. We are the continuity. When there is chaos, we are the order. We are the strength of nations made physical. The burden is heavy, but we are given no other choice."

"I like to think we have plenty of choices," Keyleth says.

J'mon puts their elbows on the arms of their chair, folding their hands and resting their chin on them. They give Keyleth a keen look, and it's only through long familiarity that she sees past the inscrutable flame of their pupils. "Is it really making a choice if only one of the options is something you can live with?"

"I couldn't live with myself if I'd chosen another life," she says. "There was a time when I didn't feel that way, but it seems like-"

"Instants," they say, when she stalls out. "The fancy of a moment that felt like years at the time."

"Yeah," she says.

"When we have centuries, the inevitable becomes the obvious," J'mon says. "That does not make our struggle less or our work easier, but we see what must happen in a way others do not."

Keyleth doesn't respond, turning the idea over in her mind. The silence stretches on, and somewhere in it J'mon pulls Keyleth in, the two of them sinking to pillows on the floor, looking out over the sunset. Keyleth rests against them and sips her wine, watching the sun dip lower in the sky.

"Does it bother you to be humanoid all the time?" Keyleth asks suddenly, which feels rude; she doesn't think she's ever been that brazen about it before, but it's never been on her mind like it is now. "Wouldn't you rather be in your true form?"

J'mon shrugs, though they don't look offended. "I am one, I am the other. There is a truth in being what people know me as, just as there is a truth in being what I will die as."

"You're just really good at being both of them," she says, feeling suddenly ashamed. "I never got that part down."

"You are a fierce creature when you take a new shape," they say, though Keyleth thinks there's something pensive about their expression.

"I think that might be the true part," Keyleth says. "I think I'm better at it. I always have been."

J'mon pushes Keyleth gently away and stands, walking to the window. "Then be what is true," they say, stepping off the edge; Keyleth's eyes track the way their back arches, the way skin and scales both coexist for just a moment, and then Devo'ssa is there, hovering next to the tower. 

Keyleth stands, pushing herself to her feet with the aid of the Spire. Something in her back twinges, and she ignores it, walking towards the edge of the room instead. She opens her arms and leaps, and in the air her wings unfurl, her body expands, her whole consciousness pushes outward. Suddenly and perfectly she is almost as large as Devo'ssa, her scales the same copper that her hair once was.

"We have one hour," she says, like someone told her long ago, and the two of them fly into the mountains and are gone.


End file.
